Sunday, August 31, 2008

It's Malaysia's 51st anniversary of independence today. Technically, Malaysia was born on 16 September 1963, instead of 31 August 1957. Sabah and Sarawak were not independent from the British colony until 1963. But for some reasons, the whole country celebrates independence on 31 August.

This year's National Day is the most extraordinary one since the beginning of Malaysia. Last year at this time, the right-wing ruling party Barisan National was so firm on its ruling position, hardly anybody thought that the political arena can change so drastically by the next National Day. It's amazing how things can change so much within just one year.

The last half a year has been too chaotic in the Malaysian politics. It's probably not that bad compared to some other countries because we do not have violence involved (yet). But for a country that has been enjoying peace for the last few decades, the current situation is pretty big a deal. Malaysia is clearly going through change, and there are two possible types of change - sudden and gradual.

A sudden change is like boiling a pot of water. The water is forced to heat up to boiling temperature, energising water molecules to move rapidly and chaotically, and subsequently vapourising it to the new gaseous state. This process involves an agent to expedite the process - heat. In some cases, the heat may not be sufficient to convert the water into gaseous state. It merely heats up the water, so the water remains in liquid state - that is, no change has occur, eventhough there had been some chaos within the water molecules. However, the heat, insufficient it may be, would have helped speed up the second type of change - the gradual change.

A gradual change is like letting the pot of water to vapourise in ambient temperature. The process is so slow, that the change from liquid to gaseous state is hardly noticeable. The agent involved is still heat, but it is much less prominent. Water at the surface transforms into gaseous state when it absorbs enough energy from the air, and similarly, water vapour near the surface also transforms into liquid state when it releases some energy, both process at the same rate. However, as there is wind movement above the water surface, water vapour is blown away, leaving dry air for more water molecules at the surface to vapourise. So the speed of the process depends on how much air movement there is. If the water was pre-heated, it would take lesser heat absorption, and hence, time to transform into vapour.

So now, let's see which type of change is Malaysia going through. There is chaos, yes. It happened quite suddenly, and there is a pretty strong agent forcing the change - the opposition parties. So it is safe to conclude that Malaysia is going through a boiling process. However, we do not know yet if the agent is strong enough to cause a complete change - that is, if the heat is sufficient to boil the water. What we do know is that things could well be moving towards an ultimate change, even if this time around the water does not boil.

If only we can change without compromising peace, wouldn't the world be a much better place?